There are basically two commonly known systems for routing incoming calls to one or more of a plurality of agents' positions. An automatic call sequencer having limited capability is used for routing calls normally in telephone systems having anywhere up to twenty-four incoming telephone lines. A far more complex, more versatile and relatively far more expensive system for routing telephone calls is the automatic call distributor system which can handle usually in the range of 100 to 200 hundred incoming telephone lines. A call sequencer performs some of the basic functions of an automatic call distributor. However, it does not normally have a capacity to track the activity of individual agents and provide for effective assigning of incoming calls to the agents to ensure an essentially equal distribution of the work load.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,451,705 discloses a known type of automatic call distributor system. This system includes the particular feature of providing an identification code uniquely associated with a particular user of the system. Such code is entered by the agent when the agent connects to the system, normally by dialing in its code. The automatic call distribution system is able to identify the agent at a particular station to which an agent has connected. As noted, however, with such automatic call distribution systems, they are very costly and are usually only economically viable when used with incoming lines of fifty or greater.
A modified type of call distribution system, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,408,100, attempts to equally distribute incoming telephone calls among a plurality of agents-serviced positions in the key telephone system. The incoming calls are distributed to agents based on determining which of the available agent positions for answering an incoming call has had the longest ideal time since its last online condition. This system, however, is not capable of monitoring total time each agent has been busy during a work period, resulting an inequitable distribution of incoming telephone calls because it may be that the agent, which has had the longest delay period, is in actual fact the agent which has been the busiest during the overall work period.